


sugar & smoke

by crownedcirce



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Childhood Friends, Depression, Healing, Jjbek, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Or Is It?, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-30
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2019-04-14 18:24:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14141874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownedcirce/pseuds/crownedcirce
Summary: In the way that Otabek had brought light into Jean’s darkness, Jean brought routine into Otabek’s mess.





	sugar & smoke

**Author's Note:**

> Some JJBek to both hurt and sooth the soul. 
> 
> This does discuss themes of depression and anxiety so please look after your lovely selves. 
> 
> Come yell at me on tumblr @ punktsuki

Jean had once told him while he was laying in sweat-stained sheets and oily unkempt hair, staring blankly at the clinically white wall of his bedroom; that some days are messy and your biggest achievement will be just to get up. And that it was okay. Jean was leaning against the frame of Otabek’s bedroom door when he had also told him that some days are better. And that’s okay too. Some days it’s you, picking someone else up from their own mess and for a second, you’re forgetting about yours.

 

For Otabek though, it seemed like those messy days were more common than the ones where he’d be helping someone else in any kind of way. Most days, he was bogged down with cluttered but empty thoughts, clammy in grott and surrounded by his own apathetic sighs when he could remember to breathe. _Just breathe_.

 

But Jean said that Otabek had helped, had picked him up from the dark pit that he had found himself trapped in when they were sixteen. He said Otabek had offered him his lighter that first day behind the basketball court and eventually - fiery, warm light licked away at the darkness. It helped Otabek to know that he had helped Jean. At least for a little while, it did. A sense of achievement and appreciation came with the knowledge that their late night phone calls and early morning before-sunlight walks were helping someone else. For a while, it was easier for Otabek to get up if he knew that it would help Jean.

 

It made him feel less useless. Less broken.

 

It got bad when Otabek was seventeen. His chest was constantly heavy, the dead weight of a fucking casket pressed down on him while he would lay awake at night staring at the same white wall.

 

When he missed school, Jean would be at his bedroom door precisely twenty minutes after class was let out. He’d knock at the closed door but wouldn’t wait for a response. He knew he wouldn’t get one, anyway. He would then stand in the doorway with an eyebrow arched and feigned amusement on his face.

 

“You missed a good fight today. Nekola and that Crispino kid, the poor bastard made a pass at his sister.” Jean knew Otabek had no interest in high school drama. Jean didn’t give a shit either despite how much he pretended to. Every day though, he had some sort of update, and every day Otabek would not give a response. He was ashamed, really. That Jean would come despite the mound of clothes Otabek still hadn’t put away and the dirty dishes he still hadn’t cleaned up. He was grateful though, however conflicted, because he knew that in his own way; he had done the same for Jean roughly a year before.

 

In the way that Otabek had brought light into Jean’s darkness, Jean brought routine into Otabek’s mess. Maybe it wasn’t the conventional kind, but it did help. Otabek struggled to understand how someone like Jean could ever have felt like this. Someone so dedicated and so beautiful surely could not have been a state like this.

 

Some days, Otabek had hope that tomorrow wouldn’t be a messy day. Other days he found it hard to push the selfishness down and some days, he didn’t mind if this was what his days would always be like. Sometimes it was just easier to accept his reality as it was.

 

Other days though, when he had that pair of ocean eyes looking over at him with a kind fondness, Otabek wanted to fix this. He didn’t want anyone so beautiful anywhere near his mess if he could actually help it.

 

The routine was simple. Jean would would show up at 3:20 in the afternoon, he would drag Otabek’s ass to the shower and then to his car. He did most days of course, also sweet talk Otabek’s mother; promising that her son would not be doing anything Allah would not approve of.

 

That was obviously a lie.

 

They never went far. They spent nights up on the roof of the Leroy house with Jean’s parents not even knowing he was home. Some nights, Jean would park at the hill on the edge of town and they would look out over the city. Jean once commented on the way the street lights would shine on, unbothered by the blanket of smog and smoke. He said that’s what Otabek looked like to him. Warm, bright and stubborn.

 

It was strange. Otabek had always thought of himself as cold and dull. It was always Jean who’s eyes sparkled, reflecting the few stars that broke through the cloud above them when he talked, and changed tides in the light of the moon. Blue always had been Otabek’s favourite colour.

 

School may not have been Otabek’s thing. Most days it felt impossible, unachievable. But spending hours talking to Jean about whether or not he believed in reincarnation, or what songs they wanted played at their funerals. That was Otabek’s thing. Some nights, Otabek would let Jean listen to the music he made on the rare, better days when he _still_ should have had his ass sitting at a desk in Mr. Bell’s classroom. School was definitely not Otabek’s thing but sitting on the hood of Jean’s car, sharing cigarettes, stolen beer and a pack of gummy bears definitively was.

 

Jean had just turned eighteen when they kissed that first time. It was one of Otabek’s better days, but one of Jean’s worst. Jean drove, despite Otabek’s offers. He was in no headspace to drive very far at all. They had snuck out and sat on the hood of his car just as they did when Otabek needed to get away.

 

Jean had cried and Otabek had silently kissed the tears away. It was his turn to stay strong.

 

Nothing ever did come of that kiss. It was just what they had both needed in that specific moment. It wasn’t spoken about much after that.

 

***

Otabek was twenty-three now. His better days now outweigh the number of messy ones. They hadn’t spoken in a couple of weeks, which  wasn’t unusual anymore. But here Jean was, in the living room of Otabek’s apartment.

 

Otabek knew it wouldn’t be the same for him, that time couldn’t heal all wounds. Wouldn’t heal this one. He _knew_ that his own feelings, if he so chose to act on them now, would not and could not undo the damage to this empty shell of a boy that _she_ had left his friend in.

 

“She’s gone, Beks,” Jean’s voice was shaky and drunk on pain.

 

But, Otabek wasn’t good with words. And as selfish as it was, Otabek could not help but notice the way that Jean’s eyes got even bluer when he had been crying.   

 

Just like they had been when he was eighteen.

 

He couldn’t help but wonder if he still tasted of sugar and smoke.

 

“I’m here, I’m sorry JJ. I’m here, I love you,” Otabek whispered as wrapped the crumbling man on his couch into his arms. He wasn’t good with words, he didn’t know how to fix this. He’s selfish, he knows this but that’s all he had. Jean wouldn’t take these words too literally anyway. He never had. They had shared countless ‘I love you, man’ statements. Otabek just meant it a lot more.

 

Even though more days are good days now, it takes every ounce of strength Otabek has left in him to tell Jean that everything is okay.

 

Now is not the time to tear his world apart even more. He wasn’t sure there would ever be a time. But, he would pick him up from this and make a mosaic out of their broken pieces.

 

They had shared their second kiss that day. It was salted with tears but just as sweet, Otabek thought.

 

“Stay here, if you need a place,” Otabek offered. “Sorry about the mess.”


End file.
